7 Minutes, 4 years, 6 kisses
by PercyFosterMellark
Summary: Brandon Foster was her first kiss. Her first French kiss. Her first heated groping session in the dark. But without a stupid party game, he may not have been any of those things at all. Brallie One-shot


I hated this. I hated the fact that my best friend was a freaking high schooler and pulled me along with him to this party. I hated myself for letting him pull my along to some dumbass party where there's a whole bunch of teenagers sucking each others faces off. He is only a freshman, how he got invited to a party full of drunk seniors, I didn't know. They all seemed to know him, so it didn't really bother me. I started to make my way towards Liam, who was running his hand through his short blonde hair. Just as I reached him, somebody shouted, loud enough for Liam to hear.

"Let's play spin the bottle!"

Liam looked down at me, his blue eyes meeting mine. "Can we stay for at least another hour, Cals?"

"Are you serious?" I shout. "I'm going to be stuck with a whole bunch of drunk people! I don't even know any of them!"

Liam gestures to somebody behind me. "How 'bout him? He's playing. He's in your grade, right?"

I look behind him, and my eyes land on a boy that I did know. Not a lot, but I've made small talk with him in class or in the hallways. Why he was here, I didn't know. He seemed like one of those kids who would rather stay home on a Friday night. I watch as he runs his fingers through his dark hair, and looks up, his green eyes meeting mine. Brandon Foster.

I quickly look away, and Liam grabs my arm. "Come on," Liam tells me. "Just another hour."

So I sit next to him, staring at my shoes almost the entire time. I've looked up a few times only to see Brandon Foster staring at me. Nobody bothered me, I was just some poor eighth grader that got pulled along to this party. Every time the bottle landed on someone new, the group broke out into giggles and whoops like they'd never seen two people press their lips together before. Like this was the height of some sacred mating ritual. Most of them looked like they were trying too hard, boys pawing at the back of some poor girls head.

I look down at my sneakers again when Brandon is about to spin the bottle. After a few moments of silence, I can hear Liam mutter something, that sounds like, "Shit. She's not gonna be happy."

I look up at him, and he shrugs. "Sorry." He mutters, point to the bottle that was pointing at me.

I look over at Brandon, who was still staring at me intensely. "I-um..." By the look in his eyes, I know that he's scared. "I- I didn't mean too, Callie."

He also has his hand poised in the air, like he had just spun the bottle.

My heart dropped.

I didn't plan on having to kiss somebody tonight, much less have to kiss somebody in front of a bunch of people.

I looked away from his green eyes, shamefully. I should be angry. I want to tell him that this game was stupid and that I didn't want to play it in the first place.

"Aww, come on, man. Don't make the girl feel bad," I heard a boy's amused voice urge. I couldn't even feel gratitude though for his meager defense. It was too slick. Too full of pity.

I look in the direction it came from, and glare.

"What's the problem? You think you're too good for my friend?"

Shut up, I urged Liam with my eyes, This is only making it worse.

"I'm sorry, Callie." The warm voice didn't come from my best friend. Reluctantly, I moved my head to meet Brandon's gaze, which was still terrified, but apologetic. "I didn't mean-"

"Let's just get this over with," I mutter, already moving to my knees and walking on them to his spot.

He scarcely moves, his mouth dropping open and his eyes widening in shock again.

His cheeks flushes. And his lips.

My gaze had darted there, almost without any command from me. But that was my target, wasn't it? Just lips. Pressing my lips to another person's lips until everyone stopped watching us and life could go on. They were upturned, even when he wasn't smiling. It was something I noticed over the years, he did it a lot, not necessarily at me. Like how he had to explain to the teacher about the bruises he got from wrestling with his younger brother, his face would fall only for a second before he smoothed it over with a bright smile, as if nothing had happened at all.

If only he didn't seem so terrified of me.

When my gaze darted up again, I found his eyelids drooping as if they'd been weighted. They made his eyes look normal again, just like any other person's; except for that shade of green. It was the kind of color you could see from across the room. The kind that, even in class pictures where there are 30 students crammed together on bleachers and they're all squinting into the sun, someone could look at the photo and go, Oh yeah, that green-eyed kid. What's his name?

They were intent on my lips now. And I don't know if we were taking a million years to do this, or if it just felt that way. All the noise from the group buzzed around me, indistinguishable. And the quickest way to end this would be to start it in the first place.

I leaned forward and basically mashed my face into his. But I did it so quickly that I lost my balance and before I could grab desperately for Brandon's shoulders to keep us both from toppling over, his hands found my waist and steadied me. He gently pushed me back so I could regain my center of gravity, his form following mine fluidly, his lips a hair's breadth from mine. I didn't see the reactions of the people in the room, and whether they were laughing even harder at how totally inept we were. I didn't see because I don't think Brandon and I broke eye contact even for a second. I don't remember blinking. His eyes just held mine as steadily as his hands did my waist. As soon as I was sitting straight on my knees again, and his hands released me.

I catch up on my blinks, letting my eyes flutter rapidly while I try to catch my breath. Because we still hadn't kissed. And all I could do was stare at him like a moron.

A moment before he leaned in, I felt a warm pressure on my hand. Brandon's fingers curled around my palm and gave it a reassuring squeeze. I gripped them back and his lips met mine.

His lips are soft and dry. It almost made me self-conscious about my own which were wet from the way I'd nervously licked them at the last moment. And my eyes were still open, which I only noticed because Brandon's closed slowly as I watched him. They didn't screw up tight the way I'd seen some of the other kids do.

So I close my eyes. And I forget how many senses I'm supposed to have because all I was aware of was soft. How soft his lips are. How they pucker against mine but didn't push for more. And his fingers, the pads of them slightly callused like he spent a lot of time on a rope swing, but the rest of his palm was so soft. Soft and dry against my own sweaty hand. But he doesn't let go.

And there was his scent, too. His smell. Clean, not like most boys my age. Clean like soap and laundry detergent and a freshly scrubbed face and soft, thick hair that brushes my forehead.

"All right!" Out of all the noise, Liam's hard voice is enough to cause me to rear back. Pulling away was like dunking my head in cold water and I met Brandon's eyes as they opened, hazy and unfocused. "You guys have enough of corrupting my best friend?"

There were titters amongst the girls, and guys telling Liam to lighten up, and somebody tugs on my arm to remind me to sit back in my seat.

I try not to look at Brandon the rest of the night. Not when the rest of the group was occupied and I was bored of watching Liam shove his tongue down Ashely's throat. Not when the bottle landed on me a few more times and I got to my knees to deliver a cold, hard peck just off center of these random boys' mouths. Just enough to get it over with. And definitely not long enough to do anything ridiculous like smell them.

But it's difficult. Especially when I can see him looking at me out of the corner of my eye, and when I half meet his gaze, we'd both look away nervously again, which was nothing quite so new for us-except for the lingering half smile on his face.

And it's even more difficult the few times Brandon had to kiss another girl and I studied the soles of my sneakers where the rubber was wearing down. And if I looked at him, it was only to find him looking at me with his mouth pulled to the side, sheepishly. Almost apologetically. We were all forced to play this dumb game, anyway. If there was anything redeeming about it, it was that it served as a great equalizer, because everyone had to kiss someone they didn't like or didn't know, and only once in a while did they get to kiss someone who they did-

Anyway. I definitely didn't look at him, not more than I had to.

I had to look at Brandon when I left though, because we found ourselves at the bottom of the stairs in our coats at the same time. He just smiled sheepishly at me again and gestured for me to go up first.

We made our way outside and to the end of the drive without a word. When I turned to leave, knowing my house was in the opposite direction of his, I give him a small smile, but he stops me with a tug at my sleeve.

"Hey, Callie-" he starts, before clearing his throat, likely trying to clear out the adolescent boy squeak, because when he spoke again his voice was deeper, if a little scratchy. "I'm sorry about before, um..."

He trails off and kicks the edge of the lawn with his toe, just missing the yellow weeds that had sprouted up.

I thought he was apologizing for kissing me, and it made me want to wipe my mouth with the back of my hand in shame.

But then I remembered before the kiss, the way he looked scared and reluctant, just like right now. And the shame didn't flee.

"No, but," his head lifted and he moved closer to me, his eyes so wide and earnest they were almost pleading with me. "That's not it! I just-"

I wait for him to finish, feeling the canvas of my jacket cool the heated skin at the back of my neck.

"That was my first kiss." His voiced dropped to near whisper and my eyes widened in surprise. He must have taken that for some kind of unspoken judgment, because his cheeks pinkened again under the light of the streetlamp.

I laugh. I don't mean to. I laugh and his brows furrowed like he was upset, or disappointed, or betrayed or-I don't know, but I tried to choke down my laughter and reassure him.

"Brandon," I started, and he shook his head to himself like he had earlier that evening. Before he could turn on his heel and never speak to me again, I finally manage to finish. "That was my first kiss, too."

For a moment, he just breathes. I could see the air fill his lungs and lift his chest before he let it all out. "Oh."

I shrugged again and kick the same spot he had, unsure of what else to say.

The silence went on so long, I have to look up to make sure Brandon was still even there.

He was there. And he had a big, dopey smile on his face.

I narrowed my eyes at him and he tried-and fails-to wipe the smile off his face.

"It is a dumb game," he offered with a shrug, but his upturned mouth refused to turn down, so much so that his cheeks must have been hurting. "But I-I'm glad it was you."

My mouth drops open and my eyes did that thing where they wouldn't stop blinking, like they had gone as dry as my mouth.

"I mean," he adds quickly, "that one girl Ashely looked like she could kick my ass, and most of the girls smelled like, a Jolly Rancher mixed with rubbing alcohol."

I laugh again, knowing he was probably right, that's what most of the boys smelled like.

"So are you, uh, okay to get home?" he asked. It was clear he has no way to remedy this if I wasn't, as I was pretty sure he had walked here himself. But he tucked his hands into his coat pockets and swung them like he was nervous, so I didn't point this out.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Liam said I could catch a ride, but I don't feel like waiting for him," I said, remembering the smug grin on his lips after that eye-linered Ashely girl ended their kiss with a bite to his lower lip. Gross. "I'm only a few blocks away."

"Oh, okay. Cool. Um-" he trails off, bobbing his head to some silent beat. "Well, goodnight, Callie."

His lips turned up again. Soft. Pink. Green eyes far too wide in his face.

"Yeah, goodnight," I reply, giving him an awkward wave.

I turn on my heel and started walking home, my hands clenching and unclenching in my pockets. I tried to relax my face as it occurred to me that the muscles ached from being stretched into some sort of grimace. I don't know why I feel so...out of sorts. He said he was glad it was me.

I turned my head after a few paces to find him watching me. He looks down quickly and started to shuffle away, but it gave me the courage to say it.

"Brandon," I call. He stops and turns. "I'm...glad it was you, too," I mumble, turning and scurrying down the sidewalk before I could see his reaction.

* * *

My palms are sweating. I keep wiping them on the knees of my jeans, hoping no one would notice.

Every time I look up, Brandon Foster's eyes are on me. But then, every time he looks away and then looked back, my eyes are on him. It was hard to know who even started it, but clearly neither of us had any intention of ending it.

This was more eye contact than we'd shared in two years. In some ways, things had gone on as they always had-I would walk into a room or down the hallway at school and looking up to see Brandon watching me. Except before, his eyes would flit away as if he could pretend I hadn't caught him at it, and I'd scowl, wondering what this boy wanted. If it were anyone else, I'd have worried that he wanted to hide a toad in my locker or give me a cootie shot, but I'd known Brandon since kindergarten and if he were going to bully or tease me, he'd have done it by now. Besides, Brandon wasn't a bully. That idea was laughable.

But now. Now, when I caught him looking at me, we'd both look away, cheeks heating like we had some shared secret. Which was silly, because yes, we'd kissed. But we'd done it in front of a bunch of people on a night where everyone was kissing everyone, and we'd even kissed other people.

But I guess it's a secret, because we were each other's firsts, and I didn't think anyone else knew that. And they definitely didn't know that I hadn't kissed anyone since then.

Not that I cared. I was in high school now and I needed to take it seriously. I remember asking Liam the summer after middle school if high school was hard. He wiped his greasy hands on a rag, stared blankly for a minute before answering: "Yes."

It wasn't comforting. I didn't expect him to say it was a breeze, but I hope he'd shrug it off like, Eh, you know how it is, Cals. School is lame. You get more homework. But you'll be fine.

But instead, I got a solid "yes" before he went back to working on his shitty old Jeep.

And he was right. It is tough. Honors classes guaranteed even more assignments than usual, so that on top of babysitting Jude and making sure dinner was on the table every night, I had priorities that did not include finding some horny teenage boy to suck face with.

Not that kissing was gross, per se. At least, in my limited experience of it, it was mostly...not gross.

It just shouldn't be that big of a deal, is all. Aside from my parents, I didn't really know any adult who had found the love of their life in high school- and look how that one example turned out.

And who knows? People like Brandon Foster may have kissed several different girls already. I know Liam had by this age. And if this stupid game demonstrated anything, it was that this was all interchangeable. Interchangeable body parts and names and faces.

Which is why it made no sense for my palms to be sweating like they did when I lost my footing on a high tree branch.

Mariana is sitting next to me again, and I could tell she was staring at some random boy. We aren't like Brandon Foster, for example. Brandon, who chats happily to just about everyone except me. After I complained about it to her in one class during a project, she just laughed at told me it was because he had a crush on me. I brushed it off, but then she told me that she was his sister. I believed her, I've heard him say something about having a adopted sister and brother.

I blow an errant hair out of my face. This is dumb. Just as dumb as it was two years ago.

Dumb dumb dumb each time the bottle spun and Brandon and I had to kiss. Which was twice.

The first time Brandon had to spin it he looked up at me before he did it. Like he was aiming for me. I wish he hadn't done that. It made it look to all these people like we had some secret thing. Aside from that other secret thing, I mean. Being each other's first kiss. And now my second. Which I didn't mind so much because he didn't shake his head this time or look scared. He just looks down at the bottle as it slowed to a stop in front of me and lets a sheepish half grin take over his face, one that he tries to hide when he looks up. I huff and roll my eyes at him good-naturedly, hoping that we looked like any other couple from the circle so randomly put together.

But when we reached each other in the middle, his eyes went hazy, just like they had the last time. I didn't doubt that mine probably looked the same because being this close to him brought back that memory so vividly.

I learned in freshman Biology that your sense of smell is the one most strongly linked to memory, and I never realized how completely true that was until my eyes dropped to the collar of the white undershirt peeking out from his sweatshirt- that spot was the culprit of all of this. Clean, laundered cotton. A hint of spice at the hollow of his throat. Not the product of some manufactured, bottled scent from the drugstore that boys wore to impress girls. Something else. Something as natural as the breeze carrying the smell of grass and wildflowers through the air.

He nudges my nose with his just slightly before our lips pressed together. Like last time, he didn't press too hard or move them at all. Just set them against mine like it was their natural resting place.

"Okay, now you, Callie!" Mariana's call.

Which immediately brings us to the second kiss. (Or third, if you want to widen the scope.)

Brandon laughs once, a surprised sound that caught in his throat. I just huff and made a face like, Can you believe this. Which I didn't. I didn't have any intention of having it land on him. In fact, I wasn't really even aware of spinning the bottle. Mariana must have pulled me back down beside her again, and I think I was too dazed from fear or anticipation of the next boy, or caught in thick, choking memory, that I didn't even give it a second thought before spinning.

And it lands right back on Brandon before he even gets back to his seat.

"Tongue this time!" someone yells. People laugh, Brandon did finally get that shocked look back in his eyes, and when I glance at Mariana, she just shrugs like, them's the rules.

She didn't even seem remotely disgusted that I was about to kiss her brother again.

I don't even pretend I didn't know those were the rules. I do. This was just a way for antsy adolescents to get some human contact. It's not like they were going to assign referees.

And I wasn't about to draw more attention to myself by arguing.

This time it was me giving him a comforting, sheepish smile as we leaned in. Before my eyes slid shut though, he whispers so that only I can hear him under the murmur of voices and distant music playing.

"Callie, I don't...we don't have to. We can just pretend. I'll just move my head to the side-they won't even know."

"Whatever," I say quickly. Dismissively. But despite the stiff way I lift my shoulder, I can hear the tone of my voice and it came out as something else. Something breathier and more full of...possibility. Like I was giving permission for whatever.

My eyes shut against the intense look he is giving me. I wait for the press of his lips, but a split second before I felt that, his hand came up to cradle my face- fingers sliding past the skin behind my ear to find purchase in my hair, his thumb whispering lightly across my jaw. Then I felt his lips against mine. And I focus on that and let him do what he wanted. Let him tilt my head just slightly, let him adjust his lips so they were wrapped around my bottom one, more than the light pucker I was used to from him. I just waited for him to play-act- to pretend that we were sharing some steamy, open-mouth kiss that everyone seems anxious for.

Except, just as I open my mouth a little to get more air in, he moves his lips to capture my top one instead and just when I expect the kiss to end, I feel a smooth swipe of his tongue under my top lip. The movement so slow, but so measured that only I probably knew it had happened.

And I could feel myself shudder. But his hand didn't leave my face until he had fully pulled back and my eyes were open again. Open and focused on nothing and everything. I plopped back into my seat.

I hear some disappointed groans. Clearly, this crowd was used to the kind of tongue swirling, jaw gaping, alien-like make out sessions courtesy of people like Ashley and Liam.

But my lips are numb like they've been rubbed with peppermint salve and I've never been so aware of how many things could, and should, go into a kiss. Lips and tongues and teeth all together. Not just a showy display of spit swapping.

That's also the moment that I realized Brandon seems way too good at this.

This was maybe only the third one of these parties I've been to, and it was the second time I've played this game. Brandon was far more popular than I am. How many parties had he been to? How many rounds had he played? Just because I never saw him at school with a girl on his arm didn't mean I knew anything about his experience. Aside from knowing that I was his first kiss.

The downside of this game- one of the many downsides- was that it was like Monopoly. It never seems to end, no one really knew the point, and it often led to drama and hurt feelings.

I merely cross my arms and waited for a good excuse to leave. After Vico landed on me and tried to grab my waist before I pushed him away with barely a peck, I was ready to take my opportunity.

Except, of course, I couldn't, because everyone insisted I have to take my turn.

So I spin the bottle and it landed on Brandon Foster. Apparently, the one boy in the universe God had destined me to kiss. Four times.

I get to my knees and made my way toward Brandon like I was being led to slaughter. He must have noticed, because he didn't look so frightened as he did...sad. Or regretful. Or whatever he was trying to tell me with those ridiculous puppy dog eyes.

"Nope, nuh uh!" Vico calls, his eyes mischievous and bug-like under nearly translucent lashes. "The third time means you go in the closet. Seven minutes in Heaven!"

I wanted kill him. He is probably still smarting from the half-kiss I gave him. It served him right for being an overeager pervert.

"Wha-" Brandon starts, clearly one of the few people who didn't know what that meant, as everyone else was hooting and making crude gestures.

I put him out of his misery because he looked so lost. Also, because if he didn't know what it meant when you landed three times on the same person, then maybe he hadn't played this game as often as I thought.

I stand from the floor, my chin high and proud, ignoring everyone around us, and hold out my hand to him. He scrambles quickly to his feet and takes it without a word, his eyes wide but trusting.

"Seven minutes and no more, you pervs," I call, and everyone laughs harder.

I find the closet where some of us had hung our coats. Thankfully, there weren't so many that Brandon and I couldn't fit inside. The thought occurred to me that if it were overflowing with coats, then maybe Brandon and I would be off the hook.

I step inside and pulled Brandon in behind me.

"We're supposed to stay in here for seven minutes," I explain.

"Well, yeah, I figured that," Brandon answers, fumbling for the light. It lights up overhead and the waves hanging over his forehead shadowed his face. "But what are we supposed to do in here?"

I raise my eyebrows at him. A flush blooms across his cheeks.

"Okay," he manages after a moment, staring at his shoes, "but like, just kissing, or-?"

He trails off and then looked up at me, expecting me to finish. Like I was the expert on makeout games and fooling around in closets.

"I don't know, Brandon," I say. "Whatever."

He is just looking at me, hands in his pockets.

"It's already been a minute or two, probably," Brandon says shyly. "We can just- keep standing here."

"Right," I nod.

"Except-"

"Yeah?" I asked quickly. He steps closer and I had to crane my head to look at it. He'd grown more than a few inches in the last two years. His shoulders were broader. He has more muscle, and he looks like he could be a senior.

"Well, usually when people make out, their lips are all red and swollen, right?" I nod. "I mean, when you and I-" He clears his throat and looks away. "And their hair is a little messed up." He gestured to mine. "I dunno, if you wanna make sure they don't send us back in here for not following the rules..."

"Right," I say, like I understand what he was saying. But I just stand there, at a complete loss for what to do.

After a second, his hand raises in the air. I expect it to land on my jaw again. I tilted my head back just a little, unthinkingly.

His finger come up to my hairline, his palm just glancing off the skin of my temple. He pulls at a piece of hair, so gently that all I felt was a small tug as it came loose from my braid and probably stuck up an inch or so at the top of my head.

A breathy laugh escapes me as I realized what he was doing and he smiled. His other hand came up and ten fingers carded through my thick hair, pulling it away from my neck and loosening my braid. A piece fell into my eye and before I can flick it away, Brandon gently swept it aside, his hand trailing across my forehead as he smoothed it back in place, his fingers lingering right above my ear, which was searing hot.

"That kinda defeats the purpose," I tease, my voice thick.

"Right," he says with a short, breathy laugh, but he doesn't move his hands.

I move mine. Right into thick, ashy brow waves. We both let out a deep exhale at the same time. Loud. Shaky.

I run my fingers through his hair, and he gives me a small smile.

"Maybe, um," he whispers, "you should bite your lips. Make them look red, ya know?"

"Yeah, sure," I nod. This seems like a good plan of action. "You could, too."

"What?" he asks, his eyes wide, almost black in the low light.

"I meant you can bite yours...I mean. That's what I meant," I stammer.

"Oh, right," he mutters, but it doesn't seem like he really heard me.

His eyes ware on my lips now, there is no helping it. Two inches away, hands in each other's hair, his eyes on my lips. My brain really doesn't stand a chance.

"Either way," I shrug, which was difficult since my hands were in his hair. Really, it just made my chest rise, like I was offering myself up to him. "Whatever."

His lips ware on mine. Hard. Fast. Hard and soft. Soft lips that are insistent. I tug at his hair, strands falling through my fingers, and his mouth opens a fraction. This time I take his bottom lip. A pink, soft bit of flesh and it was the best thing I'd ever had in my mouth. Brandon's lips.

He tastes like peppermint. So do I. Clearly we both came to this party prepared for the possibilities.

I would have forgotten to ever relinquish his bottom lip, but he does that thing again. Drags his tongue inside my mouth, just under my lip. I whimper, the sound loud in the space between us, but I was glad that it was probably muffled by the door and the people making noise outside. It isn't for them. It is just for him.

"Is that okay?" he asks. I scowl at him, resenting that he was wasting his lips on words when we only had 420 seconds in here and we probably wasted half of them playing with each other's hair.

Yes it was okay. It was especially okay because he looks so hesitant about it. Like it was maybe only the second time he'd had his tongue in a girl's mouth. My mouth.

"Mmm." It was a "yes" against his lips because I drew him back by his hair before I could form the word.

But I want to know what the inside of Brandon's lip tasted like.

And as soon as I made the attempt, my tongue meets his- he was probably in the middle of repeating the same motion on me since I clearly like it so much. It good too, though. We both moan and he tilts his head so he can better stroke my tongue with his. His hand cradled the back of my head, his callused fingers moving against my scalp. It was weird. It also makes my arms break out in goosebumps.

He seems to miss my lips, because he pulls away just a fraction and worked his around each of mine frantically, pulling and nibbling so much that I was sure they were red. Redder than I ever could have made them myself. I just let him do what he wanted, liquid in his arms, darting my tongue out to taste any part of his mouth I could, whenever I could.

A loud thump at the door makes us both jump, but we stay connected, arms wrapped around each other, mouths frozen mid-motion, but still touching.

"Time's up, lovebirds!" someone calls.

Brandon's eyes are needy. Reluctant. Desperate. But the person outside the door keeps thumping, and he stepped away, turning his back to me for a moment and facing the wall.

I frantically smooth my hair down and when Brandon turns back around, he gives me a shy smile, but his eyes were amused, his brows furrowed.

_Oh_, I thought. This is the look I was going for in the first place. My hands drop from my messy hair and I smiled at him. He reaches out to squeeze my hand and lets me out first.

We ended up leaving the party at different times because Liam had promised my mom he'd pick me up after his shift at the gas station. He wouldn't be happy if he knew I've walked home alone, especially since I was a good mile and a half away.

The nervous eye contact with Brandon is still there, and even though we blush and fidget like always, this time we shared secret smiles across the room. That is, until Liam came to the front door and yelled for me, telling me it was time to get going.

I say goodnight to Marian and a few other people, but when I turn to find Brandon's eyes, there was no smile on his face. He looks almost...guilty. And he turns back to his conversation with Tayla Jensen and I walk out the door with sweaty palms.

* * *

I was at another boring party until Liam decides to speak up.

"Yo, everybody! Who wants to play a game?" Liam booms over the top of the crowd.

"What game?" someone shouts back.

"Hell if I know."

People started shouting suggestions. Charades earns a groan. Flip cup has the same requirements as beer pong. Someone shouted "Spin the bottle!" and my face turns to stone. I will kill that person.

"Oh, no!" Maraina says, and I relax gratefully. Before she tacks on, "We can step it up from there- Seven Minutes in Heaven!"

"Are you fucking kidding me?" I bite out.

Mariana has the decency to look sheepish. She knows about the extent of my experiences with Brandon, not beyond the two kisses she bore witness to the last time I played this game. But Mariana is perceptive. She doesn't push me or ask personal questions I didn't want to answer, but I'm sure she observed enough times how Brandon and I would purposely seek each other as if only to avoid the other person's gaze.

And even if she doesn't know that, she knew me well enough to know I was not up for the bullshit of this game.

"Sounds like some of these horny assholes wanna play," Liam says.

"What is even the point of you?" My tone poisonous, but he just smiles at me. "Don't you have to play Spin the Bottle to get to that part anyway?"

"Nah," Liam says, arm dropping over Mariana's shoulder, making her eyes light up. "Just write down a bunch of names, put 'em in a hat, then pull two and shove them in the closet."

"You've learned so much at college," I say dryly.

I don't write my name on a slip of paper.

Mariana does.

I threaten her, say I was going to leave her alone at the party, but even as she scrawled my name down, all the horrible possibilities were outweighed by the good ones. What if this was my chance to try kissing another guy? Just to see what it was like, to say that I'd done it. Especially since I wasn't all that likely to go out and find a guy on my own, for lack of both motivation and ability- if I've ever flirted in my life, it wasn't on purpose.

It couldn't even be Brandon. There was no way. It was too far fetched to even believe that to be a possibility. Especially if he isn't playing.

But he is. I watching him quickly jot his name down while Mariana loomed over him, and the surge of anger in me renews.

I was under duress. He didn't have to play. He could have gotten any number of girls to fool around with him, closet or no. I can name them for him.

I bite down on the inside of my cheek, glaring daggers at Mariana when Liam hiked her up to stand on a chair so she can pull the names.

"Okay," she starts. She grabs one sheet of paper from the hat. "The first person going into that closet is...Callie Jacob!"

As if there were another Callie. Another Callie whose life she could ruin. I'm gonna kill you, I mouth. She tries to look apologetic, but I can see the smile on her face.

"And Brandon!"

This time Mariana avoids my eyes completely. It was like she had swapped bodies with Brandon because he had magically regained the ability to meet my eyes. I just level him with a blank, bored stare. If he thought he could charm me with a sheepish grin, or a hangdog expression, or brightening cheeks, he is wrong. I'm already over it. Zero seconds in.

"Just, um, use the closet down the hall," Mariana points, finishing on a squeak as Liam lifts her around the waist and plants her back on the floor.

"Maybe you should use the closet down the hall," I grit out as I walk past her. This time she had the decency to look scared of me.

I walk down the long entry hall to the closet under the stairs. It was large, clean and organized, if a little low in height. I don't even check to see if Brandon was following me. I step in and lean against one of the walls, finding him right on my heels. He has to duck to clear the doorframe, but once he is inside, there was just enough space so he doesn't have to bend his neck.

"Wow," he says, pulling the door shut behind us like it's no big deal. "I was afraid I wasn't gonna fit in here."

"What a shame that would have been," I tell him dryly, crossing my hands across my chest.

I can see his Adam's apple move in his throat when he swallows. But he merely smiles and tries again. "Glad I didn't bump my head."

"Yeah, well, the taller guys probably wouldn't have cleared it."

He drops his head and I try not to feel bad. I called up every memory of the times we met eyes accidentally and I silently begged him to hold contact, to grin at me, to try to catch up at me after class. And he never did.

"Callie," he starts, finally looking up at me, his eyes doing that painfully earnest thing that I'd learned not to trust. "I'm not doing this on purpose, I swear to god. I mean, it's not like...it's not like I'm upset about it or anything. I think I lucked out, but-"

My fingers dig into my biceps.

"But I don't want you to think this is by design. It's just a weird coincidence over the years."

"Mm," was all I offer him. He keeps looking at me beseechingly, his eyes running over my features like he was trying to decipher sanskrit. "Well, we've already been in here a minute or two. We can just keep standing here." I echo his words from two years ago and I could tell he remembers them.

"Okay," he says quietly.

"Okay?" I echo. I didn't meant to say anything. I'd as good as shut him up, made him think I was miserable to be stuck in here, that I hate him. And I did hate him a little bit, enough to want to claw at his skin and get inside. To discover all the secrets he hid behind his smiles. To know why he kissed me hotly and touched me like I was some sacred thing. Like I was the first girl he'd ever looked at. The girl he wouldn't stop looking at.

"Yeah..." he ventures, brows furrowed. "I, well- I'm not gonna make you do anything you're not comfortable with just because of some stupid party game."

"You clearly never thought this game was stupid, first of all, because you keep fucking playing it." He openes his mouth to answer me, but I cut him off. "And secondly, who says you have to make me do anything? Why wouldn't I just be doing what I want to do?"

"You can-"

"And how would you even know what it is that I want?"

"What do you want?" he asks eagerly. He hasn't cower at my anger, and the confusion on his face was replaced by something that burned hotter. As hot as my skin did in his proximity. As hot as my ire every time he looked away from me.

"What do _you_ want?" I throw back at him.

Before I get the whole sentence out, I'm pressed against the wall, hard enough to make a thunk and have the coats in the closet swinging on their hangers.

Both of our mouths are open, tongues hot and searching without the slightest hesitancy. His hands are in my hair again, ruthless this time, he grasps the strands firmly enough in his large hand near the base of my skull so that it doesn't hurt, but it does force my head back so he can get deeper into my mouth, letting his tongue and teeth travel inside and out, even past my bottom lip and over my chin in playful nips.

I detoured to his hair, just to remind my fingers of what it felt like so they could remember late at night when this was all over and he was back to ignoring me. But they didn't stay there. I wanted new, undiscovered territory; everything I could get in less than six minutes. Every inch of golden hair and skin I could grab onto.

I grasp at his waist under his shirt, making him shudder and run his teeth along my tongue in response. My hands grazed the cool metal of his belt.

He pulls back and looks at me in a daze. "Jesus Christ," he whispers. I thought he would stop me right there.

But he leans forward, captured my top lip, and ran his tongue underneath it. I had to squeeze my eyes shut to stamp out that stupid urge to cry.

Thankfully, he distracted me enough to help with the cause. His hands left my face, travelled down my sides, his thumbs purposely brushing the sides of my breasts as they went, and then grabbed my ass. They move just a little lower and I knew what he wanted, what we both wanted. So I grab the shoulders that had broadened so much it was inhuman and vaulted myself up with his help, winding my legs around his waist.

He feels so good. His scent is surrounding me, his mouth is soft but responsive under my explorations, and he let me rub up against his erection until I was panting and cursing the two layers of stiff jeans between us.

He let me do all this and groaned through most of it. Moans quietly into my mouth. Cursed against my ear and then laved the flesh around my earlobe with his tongue like he was apologizing for the filth he'd let into it. He grunted and shifted me higher so I didn't slide down, and even still, I felt weightless in his arms.

"Fuck, you smell so good," he pants into the meager cleavage at the top of my shirt. "You always smell. So. Good."

His hands let my hips, trusting me to hold on, and they slid up under my shirt and over my stomach. He looked up at me under lowered lids, his eyes drugged and dark and full of intent despite their question. My back presses against the wall again and his lips travel down my neck.

"Brandon," I whisper, his name carried out of my mouth on a ragged breath.

"Say it again," he begged.

"Brandon." He doesn't even have to tell me.

His teeth nip hungrily at my neck, making me gasp when he lets his tongue slide over the newly sensitive skin, planting a few kisses.

"One minute!" Liam calls from outside the door.

We freeze, sharing air and wide-eyed, desperate expressions.

I sag against him. His eyes went wild and he begged me with them just like he had to say his name. "We have a whole minute," he says, brushing the hair from my face, following it with his lips across my cheek. He says it with a sad smile.

And I know a minute wouldn't make a difference. If he ended it in a minute, or 5, or 60, it didn't matter. It was still ending tonight. Just as it always did. We'd go back to being what we'd always been to each other- a secret, a few shared glances, the promise of some future party, and barely an attempt for more outside of it.

There'd never be enough time to explore every inch of him. He didn't want to give me that. He didn't want to give me anything outside of this closet. I wasn't good enough for him, or maybe I was too good, because I wasn't going to let this happen anymore.

I straighten my hair and my clothes, ran my tongue along my lips to capture one last taste of him, because I was a glutton for punishment. When I look up, he is just standing there staring at me. I don't know if he is just shocked, or if he knows this was the last time he'd see me like this and he was trying to commit it to memory.

"Is that what you wanted?" he finally asks. His voice isn't accusing, just curious. And resigned. His shirt was halfway off his shoulder and I couldn't stop myself from stepping forward to fix it.

"Does it matter?" I ask flatly, and before he could answer, Liam pulls the door open and I leave Brandon behind.

* * *

Why I was letting Mariana give me a tour of her house, even though I've been here before. It seemed even worse at the fact the she had to talk to me for an hour before I finally decided that it wouldn't be too bad if I come over to her house tonight, but it wasn't her party, it is Brandon's. How he managed to get beer in his house with out getting in trouble with his mother being a cop, I don't want to know.

I lean against the counter in their kitchen, listening to Mariana complain about how she can't go see One Direction when he walks up to us, a water bottle in his hand. Over the years, I noticed that he never drinks at parties.

"Can I talk to you, Callie?" He asks me, his green eyes staring at me.

I look over at Mariana, who just shrugs. "Go ahead."

Mariana disappears, and Brandon smiles at me sweetly. "Want anything to drink?" He asks.

"No thanks, I'm good." I tell him stiffly, which only causes his smile to widen.

"Come on," Brandon says, taking my hand, waiting a few moments to see if I would pull it out if his grasp. When I don't, he starts leading me out of the kitchen, and up the stairs to his room. "Let's go somewhere quite."

No matter how many times I've been over to his house, I've never been in his room, or seen it. Most of the time, his door was closed, or Mariana would be to busy talking to me for me to notice that the door was open.

Brandon closes the door behind him, and I stand in the middle of his room awkwardly, looking at the piano in the corner.

"At least we aren't in a closet." I say.

Brandon laughs, and runs his fingers through his hair. "Yeah, I actually banned any type of those games tonight."

"You play piano?"

"Uh, yeah. I've played since I was five," He tells me. "I stopped for awhile, but yeah. I play piano. That's not what I want to talk to you about but..." His voice trails off.

"What?" I ask, stepping closer to him. "What do you want to talk about?"

Brandon licks his lips nervously. "I- uh, I want to know why you ignore me."

"What? I've never ignored you before."

Brandon shakes his head. "Forget about that, then. I want to know why you don't look at me. Or how every time we've gotten paired up for a school project, you'd always act distant. And every time I ask you about what happened at the parties, you act like it never happened."

"Brandon, you're literally the only person I can look at! And it didn't happen, Brandon. There's nothing going on between us. We're just some dumb high schoolers that got stuck in a closet together because of some stupid game."

"But we had to kiss, too. And there is a thing. You know that there is. I mean what two random high schoolers get put in a closet to make-out with each other enjoy it as much as we did?"

Must kids would come out of the closet with a disgusted look on their faces, complaining to their friends, and probably asking somebody else if they had a toothbrush.

I shrug. "I don't know. We're not like most people."

Brandon steps closer to me, and runs his hand down my arm until our hands meet and our fingers link together. "I know. But that's a good thing, right?"

I don't say anything, and the next thing I know is that Brandon is kissing me, pressing my back against the door. Then just as fast as it happened, he pulls away. "Sorry," He mutters, his mouth inches from mine. "I shouldn't have done that I mean you have a bo-"

"Brandon?"

"Yeah?"

"Wyatt's not really my boyfriend. It's complicated."

"Not as complicated as us."

"It's only complicated because we made it like this."

Brandon shrugs, making me realize how much bigger he's gotten, more muscular, broader shoulders, and even taller if that was possible for him. He was already tall to begin with.

"You're taller," I blurt. "Like a lot taller."

Brandon laughs. "And your still short. Not that's a bad thing."

"I was always short," My eyes meet his green ones, and I know he's holding back words. "It's okay. Say it." I tell him.

"When we were 12," he starts, his voice low and serious, eyes unblinking, "I was gonna tell you you had pretty hair." My mouth drops open, but he refuses to let me interrupt, squeezing my waist to keep me quiet. "When we were 14, I was gonna tell you that smelled like wildflowers and honey. And when we were 16-" he trails off, like he doesn't want to continue, but does anyways. "I was gonna tell you your ass looked amazing in those jeans."

"What are you going to tell me now?" I ask, my hands traveling up to his hair.

"That I like like you," He whispers, nudging my nose with his. "That you're more beautiful every time I see you...the closer I get." His hands trail from my waist up my back, under my shirt. "That I want you."

I pull at the hair threaded through my fingers, dragging his lips down to my so he could pour the rest of his words into me. I don't need to hear them out loud. I know with every blush, every shy smile, every catch of his breath, every time his hands shook when he touches me. I just have to make sure he stays this time. Until he is out of words and we are both just broken sounds and exhausted body parts.

"I missed kissing you," he breathes against my mouth, planting kisses alternatively on my top and bottom lip, "So much."

My hands measure the breadth of his shoulders, study the shape of his ears, reacquaint themselves with the strands of his hair. The way I take it all in sounds careful and measured, but it was more like a lifetime of desperate exploration crammed into seconds and minutes of mindless, frantic touching.

His hands travel over my bare back, even dip to my ass, if a bit shyly.

As hard as it is to leave his shoulders, our mouths kept us in place while he tilted my head in that weird alien way I used to think was disgusting, and nibbled on my lips when he needed to catch his breath. My fingers make their way down his chest, unbuttoning the top of his shirt. After I finally get all of them to unbutton, I shove the shirt off his shoulders with a lot less finesse. Before he can pull back with a question in his eyes, or toy shyly with the hem of my top, I merely tug it over my head.

Brandon watches me with his hands frozen in the air, like I'd turn to sand if he touches me.

"What?" I ask.

Brandon mouth hangs open. "Nothing, I uh, I- It's just. Wow."

He still has his hands held up like he's afraid to touch me.

I put an end to that, grabbing his hands and bringing them around my back to the clasp of my bra. I feel him fumble with it, having to bite my lip to hide my smile, and we both laugh like children when it finally slacks.

He doesn't hesitate to slide the straps down my arms, his fingers dragging gently across my skin, and the bra drops to the ground.

Brandon begins to trail kisses from my jawline, down to my neck and hits the sweet spot in the crook. I inhale sharply as his lips make contact and he responds by focusing on that one spot, licking and sucking. "Brandon, oh god- please..."

"Too much?" He teases as he presses me to his bed.

I unbutton my jeans and shove them down over my hips. I'm not graceful in the way I pull the stretchy fabric over my ankles and tug at them violently until they come off with my socks, but Brandon doesn't seem to mind.

I have to tug on his belt to remind him of what he is supposed to be doing.

"Oh, shit!" he says suddenly. "Condoms."

"Well, don't look at me."

"No, I think…I think I have some."

"Okay," I say quietly. I have no right to care.

"No, it came in like, this gag gift box my brother got me for graduation. I haven't even taken them out."

He pushes up over me, stretching for something, and returns with a shoebox that he rummages through quickly.

"What else is in there?" I ask curiously. "Some cigars and a dirty magazine?"

"No," he answers, sparing me a quick, amused glance. "Because this isn't the 1950s."

"Wow," he breathes, dragging a hand up my calf, over my hip, dipping his fingers teasingly into my mound until I gasp, and then continues his ascent over my stomach and my breasts. He ends with his hand framing my face softly.

Before he opens his mouth to say some wonderful, dopey thing that would so easily and embarrassingly turn me to mush, I say the one thing I really need to.

"I'm glad it's you."

His head falls in a pleased, breathy laugh until our foreheads are touching.

"I'm glad it's you, too."

I nod my head before he can ask the question I'd forbidden him to ask. He drags the head up to my clit once, teasingly, but before I could scream at him, he lowers it to my entrance and pushes in slowly.

It felt good at first, taunting pleasure. But when he starts meeting resistance, we both still. I urge him to keep going and drag his head down for a kiss to distract us both. Our tongues met and it soothed me, this invasion as slick and heated as the one below. It hurt— not sharply, just this feeling of dull pressure, making my skin throb even more, but I urge him to keep going, and once he is finally all the way inside, both of us breathe again.

"This is," he says in broken words across my face as he kisses me frantically, "the best thing I've ever felt."

It was. The feeling isn't mindlessly pleasurable yet, probably not as searingly perfect as it was for Brandon, but it feels right. It is all I want.

I lift my hips and urge him to move. We are sloppy at first, trying to get our rhythm, but I let him take over, let him pull me against him in a steady motion with his hand guiding my hips.

Every time he thrusts back inside me, the movement felt easier and I was building to something, especially being surrounded by his scent and worshipped by his mouth.

I was building to something, but not as rapidly as Brandon clearly was, with his eyes squeezed shut and his thrusts growing harder and less steady, his hand slippery on my perspiring skin.

"Oh!" he shouts after a moment, after a few more sloppy thrusts. He bury his head in my neck to stifle his noises. "Oh, Callie," he chants in my ears. I kiss the sweaty lock of hair at his temple.

"I love you," He whispers in my ear. "I'm sorry it took me so long to tell you."

"I love you, too, Brandon." I tell him, pushing his hair out of his eyes, making him smile.

"Next time, I'm taking you out on a date first."

"It doesn't have to be a date," I tell him, looking at the piano in the corner. "Can you play for me?"


End file.
